Chapter 63: Mysteries
"There are dragons in there, but I’d advise you to never try to tame them."
Inside the secret room, Arian sat in a rotating chair, her expression calm, unreadable, the kind of calm that came from years of sitting across from people far more dangerous than the young man in front of her.
The black flame dungeon didn’t allow anyone above tier 7 inside. That restriction alone told most of the story. It wasn’t a limit meant to protect the weak from the strong.
It was the other way around.
The creatures within didn’t measure themselves against tier 7. They were far beyond it, older and heavier in a way that numbers alone struggled to capture.
There were truly ungodly things living in that dark.
"I guessed as much."
Ethan smiled, settling back slightly, waiting for the rest of it.
He could tell there was more coming. Arian wasn’t the type to open a conversation with a warning and leave it there. She had already worked through the implications of what his evolution ritual required, connected the pieces on her own, and clearly landed somewhere with a plan attached.
So he waited.
"Six kilometers away from the dragon altar, there’s a group of lesser flying dragons."
She said it plainly, without embellishment, the kind of tone someone used when they had already turned the information over in their head enough times that it no longer needed dramatic weight.
"They’re light affinity. Their environment is very hard to navigate."
Ethan said nothing yet, letting her continue.
"You’re not after them."
She paused there, just long enough for the distinction to land clearly, these flying dragons were not just hard to catch, they were very flashy.
If Ethen went after them, even if he was strong enough, he would sooner attract a beast in the void.
"Rather, a species of dark-skinned earth dragons that live in the valley below them."
Ethan’s brow lifted slightly.
Earth dragons.
He filed the detail away without interrupting as if he were afraid that a single word from him would stop whatever was coming next.
Hela had come across them at some point in the past, Arian explained, her tone shifting into something closer to recollection. She had reported the sighting in full, noting their coloring, their affinity, the way they moved and hunted within the valley.
Arian had kept the information sealed since then.
Not buried. Not forgotten. Simply held, waiting for a moment where releasing it would actually matter.
Today, that moment had arrived.
"I understand."
Ethan nodded once, the gesture small but certain, he understood, he understood all too well.
The faster he reached tier 7, the better it reflected on Arian’s standing within White Tower. A genius attached to her name, even loosely, even informally, was an asset she couldn’t afford to ignore. Whether she intended to use that leverage directly or simply let its presence do the work for her, the outcome served her either way.
He understood the arrangement completely. There was no need to pretend otherwise.
,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Time passed.
Eventually the doors to the outer room opened, and the two of them stepped back into view together, Arian’s expression settled into the same composed calm she’d worn since the conversation began.
"He is telling the truth."
Her voice carried across the room without needing to be raised, reassuring the group of Ethen’s intentions and background.
"No one is to ask further questions."
The words landed with a finality that left no space for argument.
She wasn’t simply a senior figure within White Tower. Her standing extended into the kingdom of Bark itself, built across years of vetting and scrutiny that most people in this room could never claim to have survived, let alone thrived under.
Her word carried weight because the weight had been earned.
And beyond her personal standing, there was the Tower itself.
White Tower did not shelter liars. It did not make room for schemers hiding behind convenient titles. Whatever else could be said about the organization, its integrity at the highest levels was not something easily bought or bent.
Scum did not survive here long enough to matter, they were either weeded out from the very beginning or exterminated before they could gain relevance.
"Let’s continue," Arian said, turning her attention back to the assembled group.
The conversation resumed around her, voices picking back up, the tension in the room easing by degrees as her verdict settled into the walls.
,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Elsewhere, far from the chamber where Arian sat, an old man perched at the edge of a ledge.
Grey hair, a hand full of cards, his posture loose and unbothered despite the height beneath him. Spread before his eyes, visible only to him, were the same briefing letters Arian had just finished discussing.
The Dracontis family had specifically requested White Tower’s involvement in this year’s awakening ceremony.
Not out of any particular fondness for Arian.
She was a member of their clan yes, she was powerful, but one person alone couldn’t shape this.
They understood, in the quiet way old families understood things before anyone confirmed them outright, that something large was moving through the kingdom of Bark. Something outside their reach. Something none of them could fully see the shape of yet.
In times like that, allies were the only sensible investment.
"Another S-Ranked, huh?"
The old man’s smile deepened as he flipped a card between his fingers.
The Ace of Spades turned once, twice, catching light that shouldn’t have reached this high.
The moment his eyes settled on it, something shifted in the air around him. Not violently. Not with any dramatic display. Just a quiet folding, the space around his seated figure bending inward like fabric drawn tight by an invisible hand.
"This will be fun."
He said it softly, almost to himself, the smile never leaving his face rather pushing the boundaries of abnormal.
Then he was gone.
No sound marked his departure. No trace lingered where he had been sitting a moment before.
The ledge stood empty, the cards scattered loosely where his hand had been, as if he had simply stepped sideways out of the world entirely.
Comments